Posted
by
timothy
on Saturday December 03, 2011 @05:42PM
from the misallocation-writ-very-very-large dept.

Miniaturized stealth submarines purpose-built for smuggling are an impressive example of how much technological ingenuity is poured into evading the edicts of contemporary drug prohibition. Even more impressive to me, though, is news of the communications network that was just shut down by Mexican authorities, which covered much of northern Mexico. The system is attributed to the Zetas drug cartel, and consisted of equipment in four Mexican border states. "The military confiscated more than 1,400 radios, 2,600 cell phones and computer equipment during the operation, as well as power supplies including solar panels, according the Defense Department," says the article. Too bad — a solar-powered, visually unobtrusive, encrypted cell network sounds like something I'd like to sign up for. NPR also has a story.

Even if it is legal there will be people like the Zetas. They will simply sell it cheaper than other companies and pocket the almost 100% profit. A good example of this is moonshine. If legalising something would do away with all illegal trade in that item moonshine should not exist. Another example is black market cigarettes purchased by people to get around paying taxes on them. Do you not think the government would tax marijuana. And if you only legalised marijuana the Zetas would be around to stil

Actually a still is legal for personal use with the right documentation which is easily obtainable from your local court house. If you would like I will send you my recipes I have.

It's a cultural thing, Where I grew up many people had stills none of them had paperwork (few could read), and most of them would shoot at anyone one they thought might be from the government. "I nicked the census man last week."

Cocaine, and those types of drugs have zero chance of getting legalised for general consumption anywhere in the US. They are simply too destructive and addictive to the human body.

Cocaine is vastly less destructive to the human body than an annoyed Zeta heavy, or a corrupt DEA agent. Not saying it will become legal anytime soon, but it's clearly the lesser of two evils.

Cocaine is vastly less destructive to the human body than an annoyed Zeta heavy, or a corrupt DEA agent. Not saying it will become legal anytime soon, but it's clearly the lesser of two evils.

I don't know about that... I knew a coke dealer in college, bright kid, totally unable to resist using copious quantities of his product himself... In fact, I never met a single coke user who "had it under control." Scarcity of supply, or money, was basically the only thing I ever knew to stop a user from using.

I am all for legalization of grass, coke, heroin, LSD, and whatever else... legalization, taxation, and total transparency about who uses, what they use, how much they use, and when they use it. Bu

How many people are seriously buying black market cigarettes? Yes, there will still be a small black market for the product, but it will be so incredibly small as to be negligible. No cartel will form selling black market drugs if drugs are legalized. You'll have a few small drug dealers making very little money from it.

Define black market. If by that term you mean goods being sold without government oversight and taxation, then you'd be AMAZED at the extent of black market cigarettes. Or aren't you aware of the phenomenon of buying smokes on the nearest First Nations Reserve? If cannabis were legalized, it'd be tempting beyond the power of the various legislatures to resist to tax the hell out of it. (As is already being done with tobacco and alcohol in many places) Once the taxes start getting onerous, it becomes profita

"November 2009 â" ATF special agents bust a ring of tobacco smugglers in Northern Virginia. Culminating a 14â"month investigation, agents took 14 people into custody where the suspects allegedly paid or traded for more than $8 million, nearly 40 firearms, and drugs to purchase 388,000 cartons"

Even if it is legal there will be people like the Zetas. They will simply sell it cheaper than other companies and pocket the almost 100% profit.

I don't understand why you think that. Where's the Zetas in the fast food business? Gas stations? Cigarettes? Legal businesses would dominate because they don't need to maintain armies and fight wars. They don't need to maintain their own secret cell network. The tax on marijuana can be rather high before smuggling makes sense economically.

Many of the moonshine states have very high taxes on liquor, and/or prohibitive access methods. I can go to the store and buy a gallon of serviceable vodka for $20, almost any time of the day. Try that in a bible belt state.

Youre blaming a foreign country's problem with militant cartels on a US decision on what to make legal or illegal within OUR borders?

Im sorry, does not compute. I get that legalizing might put an end to it, but its hardly our fault that smugglers exist. Are you going to blame governments for violence in human trafficking, because they have laws making such trafficking illegal? (not saying theyre the same)

If you pull your head out of your ass it computes just fine.

You have never heard of multinational corporations? International trade? Illegal border crossings? This is the illicit equivalent of what Wal-Mart does every day when they import legal goods from China. The illegal status just makes it more expensive (read: profitable) to compensate for the risks.

No what is our fault is when we love to talk a good game about how incredibly free we are, what great freedoms we have, how our soldiers fight and die to protect our freedoms, how the flag represents freedom... then we tell adult people they can't do certain things with their own bodies and/or their own consciousness behind closed doors in their own homes. Everything wrong with the War on Some Drugs, from the cartels to the gang violence on the supply side, to the nonviolent otherwise law-abiding users filling up our jails because of drug possession on the consumption side, comes from this one massive fuck-up.

I'll tell you why governments don't want to legalize drugs. It's not because of damage to society or some other bullshit justification. No drug ever created has ever damaged society more than alcohol. It's because the naturally occurring plant-based drugs shift consciousness in a way that makes you question things like dominating others with authority, climbing the corporate ladder, sacrificing happiness for money, etc. That's a huge threat to the power-mad sociopaths who run our society.

We tolerate this now from drunks, why not tolerate stoners too? Hell, the stoners I've known have been quieter and more peaceful on the balance than the drunks, and they've often known they were impaired and declined to drive, versus the drunks who insist they're just tipsy and then back over lawn ornaments...

I don't have the answers, but I have made a few observations about drinkers vs tokers.

1. When it comes to death and dismemberment through driving, drinking is often heavily involved on the weekends. People who toke and drive often drive a lot slower, but their reaction and ability to pay attention is impaired too. Still not enough data to compare conclusively as weed is an illegal substance for casual use.

2. There are numerous cases for alcohol abuse that affects both family, friends, and the individual wit

As has been demonstrated by countless, moronic drunk drivers, what is meant to be kept behind the closed doors of one's home doesn't always stay there.

That's no justification for continued prohibition.

Some people (who are quite sober) commit murder. Clearly, we should lock everyone up in solitary confinement shortly after birth, immediately after being weaned. For their own good. No, we can't give them a cellmate because they might shank them. Of course that's ridiculous but we've got a War On Murder to fight!

What is it about people altering their consciousness so many are really so afraid of? I mean... if prohibition was working and actually prevented anyone from obtaining drugs then we could discuss its merits. But it doesn't even accomplish any of its stated goals. It's a completely invalid idea. To talk about it as though it were worth considering is either dishonest or foolish, take your pick.

They cannot even keep drugs out of maximum-security prisons. Are the implications of this really so hard to understand, or is this more like a religious belief that is impervious to evidence? Prohibition: it hasn't worked, it isn't working, and it can't work. Not even in the most ideal conditions for it (prisons). Normally when something has been falsified (by both history and logic) even half as thoroughly as Prohibition has been, intelligent people drop the invalid idea, you never hear it from them again, and they move on to other ideas that might work.

What kind of insanity causes people to continue advocating such obviously failed ideas? Do they think they can divide by zero if they just keep trying hard enough?

Like I said, I think this is a religious or other faith-based belief because it has absolutely no contact with reality.

This really sums up what Prohibition is all about:

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
-- C.S. Lewis

It's because a lot of people don't like drugs. Thus, any politician who says "let's legalize drugs" is committing career suicide. No politician will allow drugs to become legalized, nor will they reduce penalties for drug use for fear of being seen as "soft on crime".

That's the part I have observed often enough to understand but I cannot relate to it.

I certainly have my likes and dislikes. They are opinions, tastes, and preferences. I am entitled to them as anyone else is. But I never thought that my feelings about something override the facts of the matter. That's a kind of childish make-believe world I am thankful not to live in. The fact I don't like something doesn't make it less true.

I call that adulthood. By my standards, lots of chronological adults are just overgrown children. The problem is that they vote (at the polls and with their feet and wallets) and think their opinions are equivalent to facts and logic.

Every organised religion in the world would like a word with you on how human mind works and just how exceptional (or deluded about yourself) you are.

It's really simple. If you invade the sanctity of my life by forcibly trying to make something my problem (such as driving drunk and endangering me) then yes, I do have the right to stop you, most likely by calling the police.

But if you are an adult person who acts like one, and can confine the consequences of your decisions to yourself, then I have no cause and no right to interfere. If I really don't like what you do with that freedom then my best option is to provide a counter-example by not doing that with my own life.

Let's say you use drugs but you do it at home, you don't drive impaired, you don't steal or commit other crimes to obtain the money to buy them, you stay home, you sober up, you go about your business the next day without imposing on anyone or endangering anyone... on what grounds would I hassle you over that? For what? What right would I have to tell you that you may not do something just because I wouldn't?

A real love for freedom is simply not compatible with a Puritannical busybody mentality that tries to enforce its morality on others without their consent. That kind of mentality would be more at home with some kind of autocracy or other absolute dictatorship. If I don't like the books you read and strongly disapprove of them, then I don't have to read them. If I think the religion you practice is total bullshit, that's okay because I don't have to practice it. If I think the music you listen to is garbage, I don't have to listen to it myself. If I think the substances you ingest are useless and pointless and have no merit, that's alright because I don't have to ingest them simply because you do.

Unless you are posing a threat to me, I have no right and no reason to bother you over what you choose to do with your life. I don't share the insecurity and the desire to control that the moral busybodies base their lives around. That isn't how I get my jollies. All I want is to live and let live while enjoying the same freedom I want others to have. This is really so exceptional? How far we have fallen.

You missed my point. World is in general lead by public opinion, not opinion of few enlightened individuals. And as organised religion and its popularity shows, your way of thinking is rare. Most people honestly believe that THEY KNOW BETTER, even when it comes to how to live someone else's life.

Thing is, evidence out there suggests that this way of thinking is in fact hard-wired in us as a survival mechanism. So even if you think you're different, deep down inside you're not. It's a concept (in)famously kn

Making very addictive and VERY harmful drugs illegal is probably be a good way of preventing people from "trying it once" then getting hooked on it and ending up in an alleyway turning tricks for meth money.

I can't agree on it for marijuana, but meth, crack, and other such drugs are just a *bit* more dangerous and addictive than marijuana. Y'know. Just a tad.

Since when did we start using law as a sorry substitute for what should be things like awareness, prudence, common sense, good decision-making, and an ability to think for oneself? As I often say, you really don't want the kind of society movement in this direction will create.

Further, it's subtle but your reasoning (while sincere) contradicts itself. I don't think you're stupid or wrong-headed or anything like that. I think you mean well, you want the most good for others, but you're misguided concerning how that happens. That's my opinion.

Why do we try to keep folks who've never seen fire away from touching it. Because it hurts them.

We don't arrange that by making fire illegal. That's the hinge.

Grasp that and you understand how your notion amounts to protecting people from themselves, through the instrument of law backed by threat of state violence, in the holy name of declaring yourself better able than the individuals involved to know what is good for them. Can you name for me the goal or ultimate purpose of even a single particular life? In a final, ultimate way which dictates the decisions that should be made? Can you do that even for your own, let alone someone else's?

The only answer to this is freedom, the willingness to live and let live, to respect the rights of individuals to work this out on their own. It works as long as they don't impair the ability of others to do the same. Ensuring that is the proper role of a more enlightened state. The problem of what to decide for everyone is avoided when you take another path, that of letting the life that makes a decision experience the results. It tends to be self-correcting if you don't separate conscious decision-making from consequence.

What we do with fire is what we should do with drugs. We explain what it is, why it can be dangerous, why it can be welcome and useful, what the safety protocols are, what is risky and what is relatively safe, and how to use it if and when it is desired. We do this even though a single uncontrolled fire could destroy an entire forest, neighborhood, or even a city. What we don't do is send state agents armed with guns and other weaponry to imprison everyone who lights a campfire, uses a grill, or starts a car.

The article of faith is that Prohibition and the mentality behind it was ever valid, beneficial, or based on a solid understanding of reality. Plenty of ideas are well-intentioned yet utterly foolish and destructive. This is one of them.

Cigarettes and alcohol are also addictive and completely legal. So some things that are very bad for you and highly addictive are fine, but others are not?

In addition, thanks for pushing the nanny state onto us. I'm so glad you're around to protect people from themselves and try to make their decisions for them instead of letting them live and learn from their own decisions.

I've always thought it was because habitual use of cannabis tends to impair one's ability to contribute to society in a meaningful manner. Know any stoners in professional positions? Are they generally as punctual, competent and productive as their non-toking counterparts? I'm not talking about artists or entertainers, more like mechanics, factory workers, construction workers, truck drivers, etc. You know, the kinds of endeavors that help a country win a war like WWII. Most people I've worked with are considerably less competent at the job they are being paid to do after a joint break.

There are plenty of "stoners", if by "stoner" you include anyone who occasionally uses marijuana, in professional positions. And they are not universally incompetent, tardy, or unproductive. Of course if you use pot when you're working, you're likely to be less productive. Most people are less productive after having a beer, too; that's no reason to ban either one.

Further, there are really two issues here -- one, whether marijuana users are impaired in one's ability to contribute to society. Two, whether such impairment would justify banning the drug. The first I believe to be false as an absolute while it may supportable statistically. The second... well, to ban a drug for that reason is to claim that the individual is society's slave, merely a cog in a machine, and their own enjoyment means nothing compared to their productive output. That's a pretty nasty thing.

I'm curious if the effect would be even larger with full legalization, although as the article notes, part of the reason marijuana use causes less issues with driving may be that people are more likely to use it at home and thus have no need to drive. That might not be the case if weed was legalized completely, but then again it would be entirely possible to legalize it without allowing the sort of public use and consumption at businesses that we allow with alcohol.

part of the reason marijuana use causes less issues with driving may be that people are more likely to use it at home and thus have no need to drive.

No, it's because stoners are all paranoid, so they drive at exactly the speed limit, obeying all traffic laws, driving defensively so as not to draw attention to themselves.

A drunk, by contrast, will Stumble out of the party saying shit like, "We need another 24-pack, I'm good to drive," being belligerent and pushing away anybody who tries to stop them driving drunk. Then the drunk comes back the next day on foot, without his vehicle, with a bruised and scraped-up face and shunt bandages on both of his wrists.

If there's one thing that people in power hate doing, it's admitting their wrong. The recent marijuana dispensary crackdowns in California(a state that legalized Marijuana for medical use) by the feds proves that they are like the assholes who lost the debate and have resorted to angrily yelling over everybody rather than listening.

Stats out of countries with legalized drugs disagree with your statement.

And just how are you going to insure no one will drive while high?

By executing violators on the spot, of course. It's the only way to be sure.

Its against the law to drink and drive but people still do it and the same would happen if weed was legalized.

True. Counterpoint [legalizati...ijuana.com] (I've never read that particular site, but at a glance, it appears to carry most of the standard arguments and statistics, which are nearly always more convincing than naked assertions that we're all gonna die if the wacky weed gets out of hand...)

" I'm not saying I'm against legalizing weed. Just making an observation that there's always going to be some jackass who hops up and then goes out and fucks up (or ends) someone else's life."

This happens, anyway. Someone who is completely irresponsible will be irresponsible regardless of the punishment. Legalizing marijuana simply serves to not throw people away who simply want to enjoy it responsibly; just like how most drinkers don't go out and crash their cars into crowded school buses (the president included in this list).

You don't go to prison for simple marijuana possession. You *might* spend a weekend in lockup. Cook County is currently debating making pot possession (up to a quarter ounce, I think) a petty offense because enforcing it as a misdemeanor COSTS them money, rather than generating it.

Having a rational discussion about recreational drugs with your average American is pretty much impossible. It's like trying to talk about religion. They're just not educationally equipped for it. It's like trying to discuss chess with a plant.

Just so you know, what you are advocating is considered an act of war. It also doesn't remove the financial incentive to bring drugs to the US: elements of the US military are and have been major players in the drug trade. Coast Guard cutters hold a lot more cocaine than submarines, and even if the captain isn't in on it (unlikely), crew members can buy a kilo for $1000 and sell it in the states for $30k or more. Many of them do.

Did you read the story about how the ATF became the biggest gun smugglers? If t

Hmm. Seems to me the smugglers exist because there's a demand for their goods on the US side of the border. If those goods were legal here, the violence wouldn't be as much of an issue, and the smuggling business would become a more normal business. If there was no demand for narcotics on the US side, you'd be right about it not being our fault that smugglers exist. But there is, and they do, and so we are partially to blame.

Legalizing marijuana would be a pretty big blow to the drug cartels. The human trafficking comparison is just a logical fallacy, as narcotics and human trafficking are (as you note) different things.

If drugs were legalized, the drug cartels would just find something else that was illegal. When alcohol was legalized, most of the gangs didn't start up legit beer businesses, they switched to drugs (which hadn't been a huge issue until then). Gangs and cartels work drugs because there is a huge profit margin and no legal competition. There is a huge profit margin and no legal competition *because* it is illegal. Legalize drugs and they'll start dealing in guns, bombs or people instead, because they can cha

The cartels are already dealing in these things. My thinking is that there is far less of a demand for these things than recreational narcotics. Your typical pothead isn't going to say "gee, pot is legal now, I guess I'll spend my money on automatic weapons and child prostitutes instead".

Legalize pot, subsidize it for two years, and then run an ad campaign to encourage people to buy it local ("Buy American!"), if they're going to buy it. I think the cartels would be hurting pretty bad from that, at least

We can't control demand or the demanders. But demanders are pathetic; at worst, demanders run out of money and become petty criminals. We have built a huge infrastructure to jail people for spending money. Money that goes to......the other side, the Mexican government is dealing with the suppliers. There are huge profits in supply--the flip side of our problem. Supply is so profitable that the cartels rival the government in their ability to wage war.

So, yes. A foreign country's problem with militant cartels IS based on a US decision, because that the US has made breaking the law so fabulously profitable that the cartels are fighting a hot war with the Mexican government using money from the US.

There are huge profits in supply--the flip side of our problem. Supply is so profitable that the cartels rival the government in their ability to wage war.

I'd just like to add, we've already been here [wikipedia.org] and failed to learn from it:

Alcoholic drinks were not always illegal in all neighboring countries. Distilleries and breweries in Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean flourished as their products were either consumed by visiting Americans or illegally imported to the U.S. The Detroit River, which forms part of the border with Canada, was notoriously difficult to control. Chicago became a haven for Prohibition dodgers during the time known as the Roaring Twenties. Many of Chicago's most notorious gangsters, including Al Capone and his enemy Bugs Moran, made millions of dollars through illegal alcohol sales.

Sure it is. We simultaneously demand a product as well as ban it. There wouldn't be militant cartels if there weren't heavy laws that needed to be broken in order to make money. Think about it: not only do we just want the stuff, we want it SO BAD and pay SO MUCH that the suppliers can build armies, cell networks and submarines. If it was legal, we wouldn't need to shovel cash at criminals. Same thing for human trafficking- there is a demand for which there is no legal market. So an illegal market ope

(see Mancur Olson: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mancur_Olson"In his final book, Power and Prosperity, Olson distinguished between the economic effects of different types of government, in particular, tyranny, anarchy and democracy. Olson argued that a "roving bandit" (under anarchy) has an incentive only to steal and destroy, whilst a "stationary bandit" (a tyrant) has an incentive to encourage a degree of economic success, since he will expect to be in power long enough to take a share of it. The stationary bandit thereby takes on the primordial function of government - protection of his citizens and property against roving bandits.")

Their founders, and a nontrivial number of their more serious members, aren't just equipped like a government...

Back in the late '90s, the Gulf cartel wanted to cull some of their more irritating competitors. Sensibly enough, they hired a number of Grupo Aeromóvil de Fuerzas Especiales guys with counterinsurgency, communications, and assorted other handy special forces skills(a somewhat embarrassing number of whom were trained on Uncle Sam's dime at the School of the Americas, in an attempt to improve Mexico's anti-drug capabilities. Oops.)

They've suffered some rather violent togetherness issues with the Gulf cartel more recently and their founders suffered pretty dramatic attrition; but their enthusiasm for military specialists from various Latin American states, and putting their professional skills to flagrantly bloody use continues to the present...

We can hardly be blamed for not forseeing the problem, of course. None of our prior "let's train the local military notables to achieve our ends in the region" schemes turned into bloody, ethically grotesque, fiascos. Not at all. Definitely not so many of them that we had to rename the training institution just to avoid the PR fallout.

Exactly.You can't put up such a system on this scale without the acquiescence of the powers that be.

Even posing as TelMex workers, someone had to know what was going on, and that there wasspectrum being used that wasn't supposed to be there. And phones had to have been confiscatedfrom the few arrested cartel members over the years.

I suspect the cartel was being protected by some corrupt officials, or this network hadalready been compromised by the Mexican Army and the cartel decided it had outlivedits usefulness.

If someone built such a network stateside, it would take two months tops for someone to start screaming that it was there in order to distribute child pornography. You'd be totally villified over the next few months, so that by the time your trial came up, "they" might just as well take you out and shoot you.

Are engineers somehow 'better' people than politicians or law enforcement so that they can't simply be bought? I'd venture a guess that anyone willing to pay a premium over the going wage can probably find enough engineers willing to do the work.

Given the levels of organization, sophistication, business savvy, and ruthlessness needed to run a modern day, world wide drug organization, why haven't they gone legit and taken over Mexico's politics? Seriously, at some point it just be easier to influence the Mexican government into passing laws that legalize drugs and turn Mexico into a legitimate drug clearing house for the world.

I leave it up to an economist/historian to point to relevant examples in History where the only way to increase the profit of an illegal market was to legalize the market.

Because that would give us an excuse for a conventional military strike against them. As long as what they're doing is illegal, they can pretend to be petty gangsters to be dealt with by local law enforcement. Do you really think the our politicians would sit on their hands if the drug cartels tried to seize power and pretend to be a real country?

The LAST thing a drug cartel wants to see is an end to prohibition. Legalising their products would simply open them up to legitimate competitors and bring the prices (and thus the profit margins) way down.

In fact the cartels have quite a bit of influence with various officials at all levels in Mexico, but the last thing they would use this influence for would be legalisation. Instead they are used to direct law enforcement against their competitors and away from themselves, to reÃnforce their monopoly position and keep raking in the profits.

Tomorrow, when the Zeta pick up their mobiles and get a 'No Carrier' message, they'll start working on the next network. Better to have them yak away while the Mexican and US gov't listen in. Yeah, they still use codes. But being able to do the traffic analysis is a whole lot better than having no clue of who is speaking, where, and when.

Heck, maybe we can even get CarrierIQ to push an update to their phones.

Miniaturized stealth submarines purpose-built for smuggling are an impressive example of how much technological ingenuity is poured into evading the edicts of contemporary drug prohibition.

To say nothing of the infrared detecting devices, footstep detectors, UAVs, and more. Technological advancement is fueled by this cashflow. But, then, that is just another way of saying that this productive ingenuity is being consumed by a questionably productive sector of the economy. How much does it really benefit us t

To be fair, the 'miniaturized stealth submarines' are every bit as cutting edge as something you might find post-Civil War. Most of them aren't even submarines, but rather have a sealed top that sits a foot or so above the surface. Those that are fully submersible operate on snorkels, with no air-independent propulsion. They are 'stealth' merely by the fact that they are so flat against the surface waves, meaning it gets lost among the noise on RADAR and active SONAR.

Alcohol prohibition was never about money. It was about the moral uptight getting their way.

Perhaps, but it did serve a purpose.

Ken Burns [pbs.org] recent documentary on Prohibition, and the reasons for the movement that eventually got the amendment passed.

The amount of Alcohol consumed in the US was utterly staggering prior to prohibition.

By 1830, the average American over 15 years old consumed nearly seven gallons of pure alcohol a year – three times as much as we drink today

Public drunkenness was rampant. We can't comprehend the amount of alcohol that flowed in that era, because people simply don't believe you can drink that much and get anything done, which, of course, was precisely the problem.

There was very little medical science and even less education available at that time to control this epidemic, and moral indignation was just about the only tool available. After the civil war, things got much worse, and the anti slavery movement turned its sights on alcohol.

Pure alcohol isn't what your friends drink. More likely, beer, which would be about 4-6 of those per day. Then, consider the fact that this was the national average rather than the high end of the spectrum, and you can see where the problem was...

I can see right where the problem was: sanitation. Through most of the past couple thousand years, almost everything you drank had to have some alcohol in it, or it would kill you. Strangely, we started to drink a lot less alcohol once the tap water became safe.

Oh, and any decent beer has just under an ounce of alcohol in it, so we are talking 3 beers here. A bit high by today's standards, but then we have other forms of entertainment and pain relief now (and safe drinking water).

I guess that depends whether you're drinking bottles, cans or oversized mugs to be honest. I was thinking cans (12oz), which are definitely going to have less than an ounce @ the typical 5% of the average beer.

5% is damn weak beer, my friend, though I guess most light beers are weaker still. And where I come from, beer comes in 40s, which is amazingly close to the old-school average by some odd coincidence. Of course, now I sometimes drink with Russians, for whom 3oz of alcohol is "the first glass of the night" - I don't try to keep up.

Very true. I do not smoke pot and I think the prohibition against it is both stupid and very harmful to people on this planet. There are a LOT of people in prison for non-violent, drug related crimes. If you have not encountered this organization LEAP [www.leap.cc], you should.

The companies want it to be legal because they can produce it and make money, law enforcement would probably be happy not to have to deal with drug offenses, and politicians will do whatever the public wants. If some congressman's constituents want legal pot then he's going to campaign for legalization of pot or he'll be thrown out of office. (Of course, most young people don't vote and old people don't want change so they oppose legalization).The government is an extension of the politicians. The politi

I've never touched pot. I've never touched cigarettes. Hell, I've never even consumed alcohol. I am also firmly for the legalization of pot and other drugs based on the very simple principle that my body belongs to me and the government has no fucking right to tell me or anyone else what they can do with their own body.

First, "hyperventilate" that word doesn't mean what you think it does (although I suspect you may have been, while you wrote your reply; unfortunately, that mental image also includes copious amounts of spittle). If not a native speaker you did pretty well, otherwise.

Second, zetas were _founded_ by US trained killers. These were folks trained _in the U.S._ by Americans and Israelis. So, yes, the US _is responsible_ for zetas existence. Any argument to the contrary must address this fact. The thousan

So the US trained these guys when they were already a bunch of crooks, thugs, pushers, and murderers?

Oh, wait, they did that while they were still soldiers. The move to the drug trade came AFTER. That's a distinction you're missing here. You might as well say we should never train any soldiers because they could do bad things someday with that training.

Therefore, for cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin, the costs of prohibition may seem high, but the costs of higher levels of destroyed lives due to addiction to substances which render you unable to function are higher yet.

So making cocaine legal (and regulated) would result in the worse violence that we see with it being illegal?

That's a bit difficult to believe.

Particularly since it was legal to purchase over-the-counter until 1914.

The "war on drugs" is ugly. Addiction to substances which render you unable to function in life is uglier.

If that were correct then Prohibition would be preferable to the massive distribution of alcohol we have today.

Some determined people will always be able to get these substances, but by making it difficulty and costly, you save lives by preventing exposure for some in the first place.

I don't think so. I think it costs MORE lives. Again, as demonstrated with alcohol and Prohibition.

No modern society can or will allow unchecked addiction to highly inebriating substances that rot at society and destroy human dignity, and, as I said before, personal free will.

Look around the world. There are other nations that have different laws. And they are not exhibiting the behaviours that you claim they would.

Your argument is invalid. You fail to take into account the large amount of legal 'drugs' (prescriptions) that are widely available, and endorsed by the US government(not to mention many others).

So, tell me circletimessquare, how do you feel about a large amount of K-12 students being put on drugs like Ritalin or Adderall to control their 'attention span'? I'll remind you, that both of these drugs are amphetamines, and in the same class as Meth(logically, not necessarily by government standards).

I hate to inform you of this, but you do live in that totalitarian government that gives mind control drugs to its population. They just guise it as helping you through the 'wonders of modern medicine'.

Interestingly, some research shows that cocaine may be an excellent med for ADHD. Where it buzzes most people out, it settles the mind of ADDers and helps focus bringing them back into the 'real world', possibly better than any of the 'speed' drugs (Ritalin, Adderall, etc.) However research is limited.

Also (not particularly relevant), cocaine (and, IIRC, procaine and relatives) are the only anesthetics that are not central nervous system depressants.

Would you support prohibition if it caused more problems than legalization?

You're misunderstanding the difference between evidence based policy and rationale based policy.

You can make a rationale for almost anything. Most issues are not 100% black-and-white, so simply emphasizing the negatives can be used as a rationale when you want to push your own agenda.

The evidence indicates that when prescription-grade cocaine is used, the negative effects are minimal. Most of the corporeal damage comes from the substances used to dilute (ie - cut) the drug, and the true expense of maintaining a habit comes to pennies a day. The rough equivalent of drinking a 2-liter soda per day.

The evidence also indicates that people can keep a family and a job and a cocaine habit. Again, most of the social damage comes from the high expense and low quality of the illicit product.

On the other hand, making illegal something that much of the population wants gives authoritarians the perfect excuse to curtail our freedoms. The police enjoy the ability to root around in our cars, houses, and personal effects looking for drugs. The government gets to regulate how much cash we carry, where our money comes from, and how we travel because we "might" be smuggling drugs.

Don't buy into the "we need to do this because it might lead to that" mentality; don't submit to the fear.

This reminds me of an SF story, based on a real fact - direct electrical stimulation of the 'pleasure center' is possibly the most addictive mechanism that exists. Mice will literally stop eating and push the button for another 'stim' until they starve to death. So in the story there was an underground wirehead culture. It was illegal to have the wires put in, and most folks who did it didn't live that long. But a few managed to ration themselves and maintain a stable life. The protagonist was one such

Ahh, replying to self - but worth while. Link to the relevant excerpt on Wireheading [wireheading.com] from from Larry Niven's "Ringworld Engineers" - I didn't realize it was from that series, one of my favorites.